10th annual Mid City Bayou Boogaloo opens today, 5/15

What started in the dregs of the federal flood on Memorial Day weekend in 2006, is now an eagerly anticipated annual event on our festival calendar. The Bayou Boogaloo has grown to three days and begins this evening with a slightly smaller lineup than the full days on Saturday and Sunday. Here’s what I am looking forward to each day. The full schedule is here.

Dave Jordan and the Neighborhood Improvement Association kick off at 5 PM on the Orleans Avenue stage. Jordan’s outfit is sounding better every time I hear them. His world-weary voice always seems on the verge of cracking creating a sense of musical immediacy. He always surrounds himself with top-notch players.

Saturday afternoon, Pirate’s Choice hits on the Dumaine St. stage at 2:15 PM. This group blew my mind when I saw them at the Maple Leaf Bar a month or so back. Imagine African instrumentation, including a kora, hand percussion, and a stinging lead guitar, backed up with a super funky New Orleans rhythm section and you get just a bit of the idea. This band has to be heard.

Also on Saturday, catch Bantam Foxes, an up and coming indie rock band, Yojimbo—TVD’s favorite spasm-jazz band, and the New Orleans Suspects.

The act I have deemed can’t miss for this year’s Boogaloo hits at 2:20 PM on Sunday. Mike Dillon’s New Orleans Punk Rock Percussion Consortium has a mouthful of a name. They also have a who’s who of New Orleans drummers and percussionists including steel pan player Daria Durzik. All the names are listed elsewhere, but there’s hardly a player missing from the list.

For those of the faint of heart, I have it on good authority that the name of the group is conceptual, not necessarily musical. In other words, they will be playing with a punk outlook, rather than punk music itself.